BETODA

1

The drive to Silent Grains took a little under three hours. They left in the late morning in Liz’s 2180 Paladin and arrived at the Betoda scrubland sometime after noon. The stage-three rainstorm had thinned out by then, and the gunmetal sky was now leaking with drizzle. Liz’s attempt at hacking into the invis-suits proved to be a major success, and Luna was curious as to what the suits were now capable of. The main thing was the Textile Synthesis, Liz explained: the suits could mimic whatever data the user desired, whether it be an outfit, a particular set of clothing, or – amazingly – an entire facial reconstruction.

(Yes, it was possible for Luna and Vanderman to change their genders, too.)

So, for most of the trip, she and Vanderman sat in the back, flicking through the various options available to them. With a tap of her MD, Luna changed her sex, face, clothing, and even bodyshape to a small extent, although her voice remained much the same, as did her height.

Despite the incredible improvement to her tech, she was extremely nervous, worried even. This wasn’t any regular heist where a quick in-and-out hack would do the job. She was going up the Legion. Any misstep would result in a thousand bullets lashing into her at once. She and Vanderman had equipped themselves with X-45 Phantom Pistols, designed and regulated by MiliCorp, though she had her doubts that they would do anything against the Legion, if things went to shit. That was her primary concern: the if.

Dust blew across the desert wasteland like a hatch of mothflies, and BETODA — HOTTEST SECTOR IN THE GREAT TRIANGLE lay tilted on its rafter. Luna tapped into her MD and changed her suit back to its default setting. She was sweating and her neck stuck to the leather seat like cheese on a hotplate. Yeah, that sign wasn’t kidding. The temperature had risen to long before they even crossed the Zemon-Lucklanta border. But hey, at least there was no traffic. The drive across the interstate was smooooooth sailing.

Before getting here, they had stopped at the turnpike, which had caused Luna a great deal of worry – the man behind the booth could have recognised her as the criminal who stole more than two hundred grand and who, recently, was wanted for a million in cold cash. And he might have, might have even dialled 911 and got a full swat team on her tail…. Of course, had she not changed her appearance to a middle-eastern man using the haptic suit.

It had worked like a charm. The boothman figured she was some sort of crossdresser.

From there on out, they breezed across the mainland road, watching the buildings slowly vanish until all that was left was an open spread of sand, small wooden lots, and cacti.

“What else can it do?” asked Vanderman. He took on the appearance of a woman with short purple hair and an eye-poppingly gorgeous face made of half carbon-fibre, half flawless skin. A barcode was scribbled on the upper left side of his (her?) forehead. “’Sides from makin’ me look sexy?”

Luna laughed. The deep voice and the feminine bod sure made for an impressive dichotomy. “This is ridiculous.”

Liz pressed a button and the rear-view mirror descended to eye-level. “That’s all I could install. Manufacturers made ’em tighter than a camel’s ass in a sandstorm.” She fixed the mirror until she could see the backseats clearly.

“Any viruses?” asked Luna.

She shook her head. “Nope. None that I could see.”

Vanderman was too busy playing with the suit’s breasts to add anything to the conversation.

Luna rolled her eyes. “You’re such a perv.”

He laughed. “Don’t act like you don’t wanna do this right now.”

“I don’t,” she said. “I’m not a weirdo.”

“Ms Portalla pretending to be prude.” Vanderman tapped his temple and the suit immediately began disintegrating into the arachnofibre undercoat, like a trillion molecules being simultaneously ripped apart. “Ain’t that rich.”

It was a trippy illusion, the suit – Luna still couldn’t get over how realistic it was when activated. She leaned forward, feeling her neck peel from the leather, and put a hand on the front seat. “Let’s go over things one more time.”

Vanderman groaned. “We go in and grab the fuckin’ thing. It doesn’t need any more explainin’ than that.”

But to Luna it did need more explaining. She wanted this heist to go smoothly. The last one…. God, calling that a disaster would serve no good. “That’s a surefire way to get yourself killed,” she said. “Take this serious, Vanderman.”

He pulled out his phantom pistol and flicked it around his forefinger, quickly, like a western cowboy. “This serious enough for you?”

“Let’s hope you won’t need ’em,” said Liz. “You said their base was in the Mackley Shopping Mall?”

Luna nodded. “Deep in Silent Grains city. Should be easy for you to stay on the outside, so long as you don’t, ya know, bring attention to yourself.”

“That’s the idea.” She tapped a button under her wheel and the glove compartment slid open. She pulled out a laptop with a thumb-sized antenna disc wired to the top panel, flipped it open on her lap, and began typing with one hand. “Okay… so… shit, what was I gonna say? Oh right: the mall. If my predictions are right – and I think they are – then I should be able to access their security system from here. I’m not sure how far the place is exactly, but I doubt it’s more than five miles.”

“That your limit?” Luna asked, spreading her legs. “Five miles?”

She nodded. “It’s the limit of most MDs, unless you somehow have an extremely upgraded version. But that takes a lot of brain surgery and… well, I wouldn’t recommend it.”

Vanderman grunted. “I think you’re both insane trusting MiliCorp to put tech in your bodies, never mind your fucking brains.”

Liz stuck out her hand, clad in a fingerless leather glove, and made a pay-me gesture. “Money problems, big boy?”

“Nah,” he said. “I just ain’t stupid.”

“So trust issues then? My, aren’t you manly?”

Luna chuckled. “Just so you know, he’s incredibly insecure about his manliness.”

“Shut it, Portalla,” said Vanderman. She could tell he was joking.

“Guys we’re getting side-tracked.” Liz slowed the car to a stop and handed the laptop back to them. “Just take a look for yourselves.”

Luna squinted at the screen. A live feed of fifteen different camera angles were clustered together in their own windows, each either showing dark corridors where men with orange-glowing spider eyes and drab cargo jeans stood or outdoor areas where more of the same types guarded the front and back entrances. Most wore chest harnesses and slim pauldrons while others were completely shirtless, revealing muscles that could only come from years of lifting weights, gene-hacking, and sticking needles in your ass.

“So… we need to disguise ourselves as these freaks?” said Luna, already knowing they had to.

Vanderman said, “This is what the Legion looks like? I expected something more… y’know, not so bulldog ugly, ’sidering they make bank from the black market.” He leaned in closer and stuffed his pistol in his pocket. He took off his skull helmet and wiped sweat from his forehead, sneering his wolfish sneer. “You sure this is the place?”

“Confident,” said Liz. “Dead middle of Silent Grains. The mall’s supposed to be abandoned, but you know how these assholes are.”

Yeah, Luna knew alright. Where there was abandonment, there was the Legion. She’d heard all sorts of stories about them from Chip, how most of their illegal operations were done under the public eye, how even the police didn’t dare interfere with them in case there was a straight-up war between two powers. The Legion was a rather large organisation spanning the Great Triangle, which was, of course, all the more reason to fear their capabilities.

She thought about this while Liz drove off the freeway and headed towards the distant city. Silent Grains. She could tell by the giant ball at the centre. Ten minutes later they reached the city outskirts and already Luna could see the traffic building up ahead. Drones and hover-vehicles filed over the many different layers of road, while the scaffolded high-rise apartments boasted enormous tarps with different advertisements: fashion, weaponry, and, surprise surprise, stripclubs.

Some things don’t change.

It didn’t take long for them to join the tailback. At least it gave Luna more time to see the beauty Betoda had to offer. This had been the first time in ten years that she left Zemon. At twelve, she, her sister, and her mother went here as a little vacation because Luna had graduated from middle school. It was around that time her mom started getting the headaches.

The traffic cleared after ten minutes and built up after another five. This process repeated until they made it to the centre square of Silent Grains, where the gigantic statue of Earth rotated in its alabaster fountain. A holo-sign which read went around with it, sonorously humming from its projector. Pedestrians bustled from sidewalk to sidewalk, stopping at kiosks, trams, and bubblers. Palm trees curved and lazily blew with each pass of hot wind, while drones descended over the roundabout with their steady beelike thrums, more than likely designed as mobile camera systems, and if not, then AI traffic wardens looking to report any infringement. They were banned in the bigger cities mostly due to how unreliable their judgements had been. Luna supposed Silent Grains didn’t quite get the memo.

BRIGHTNEST — 24/7 LADIES’ CLUB motioned across a black screen, stuck on repeat and flashing with pink. She’d seen this place before on her vacation, but back then she didn’t know what a ladies’ club was. The memory brought a smirk to her face.

Then her eyes trailed over to the far right side, following the direction the Paladin was taking, and she saw a large building with a Ferris-wheel-shaped lattice. The entrance window was a large vertical VDU, gathering rust at the corners and displaying an animated phone at the centre. 5:01 P.M., the time on the phone read. Luna’s eyes surveyed the front yard beyond the riveted gate and the open sprawl of sand, the ramshackle cars and scrap-metal walls, those bull-polished leather tarps, and stopped on MACKLEY SHOPPING MALL. The ‘Y’ was missing and had been replaced with its dustprint, while the ‘M’ in MACKLEY had been turned upside-down to show a flat W.

Wackle.

The entrance had been boarded up with wooden planks and barbed wire. A ghost town at first glance, but Luna knew this place was more than it appeared on the outside. An almost sinister expanse.

The Paladin approached the gate and Liz shut the engine off. “This is it.”

Luna went to take a sip of her water but found that the bottle had been empty. “Seems… nice.”

Vanderman pointed at the laptop screen. “Hey look, it’s us.”

Luna looked. He was right. One of the camera screens () showed the front gate, and beyond it Liz’s Paladin. “Can they see us?”

“Not till you step out,” said Liz. “Speaking of.” She turned around and fixed the rear-view mirror so that it faced Luna fully. “You decided on your appearance yet? You’re gonna need to look, ya know, familiar to them. I included a list of real people in the AI.”

Luna sighed. She tapped into her MD, selected , , and navigated the suit’s storage for . Once selected, she hit and, just like that, she felt that strange pins-and-needles sensation. Only this time, instead of turning invisible, the haptic suit transformed into multiple pieces of clothing. First, a pair of buckled drawstring cargo pants appeared over her legs. Then the fibres around her arms climbed her shoulders and created a blue skull bandanna over her breasts. A sleeveless leather jacket wrapped around her torso, revealing those steel-grey cybernetic arms which, despite the AI’s enhancements, remained untouched.

“Whoa,” she said, running her hands along her body, and then she looked at the rear-view mirror. The arachnofibre moved up her neck and created a pair of goggles along with a two-filtered gas mask. Her hair turned barbie pink, still shaved at one side, though the lightning-shaped stencil had been replaced with a horizontal line. Her eyes shone with orange. She tried to pull the gas mask off to get a closer look at her features but found that it had been impossible.

“Oh yeah,” said Liz. “Forgot to mention that. You can’t change the suit’s image. You’re stuck like that until you disable it.”

“Really?” said Luna, slightly annoyed, her voice muffled.

She nodded with a glossy grin. “Really.”

“Don’t matter.” Vanderman patted her shoulder. “You look just like ’em. Best try acting like it too. Doubt they’re as stupid as we think.”

Luna was already aware of that. There were so many risks going in like this, but she saw no better option. “Alright. Your turn, Mr Man.”

“Hold on.” Vanderman pressed the side-button on his helmet. It took him multiple tries before he was able to select his disguise. Once he did, he took on the shape of one of the shirtless men; he had those menacing spider eyes along with a blood-red mohawk, and his muscles were ripped and grainy.

“Took you long enough,” said Luna. “And you have the body odour to go with it.”

“Bet you wish you had an MD now, huh?” quipped Liz.

“Nah, all it takes is a little bitta patience,” said Vanderman. “You two on the other hand… you two lack that.”

Luna snorted. “Right.”

“Okey-dokey,” said Liz. “You two should get moving. They might get suspicious if we sit around here for too long.”

Luna sighed. “Alright. Ready to go, Vanderman?”

He popped the door open. “Ready’s my middle name. Let’s get ourselves an anti-virus.”

“Good luck out there,” said Liz.

Yeah, we’ll need it.